Re: Starter For 401 question

[farna@xxxxxxx]

You know Ken, I built a 195.6 like that once. I got in a hurry to assemble the thing, and didn't notice that the machine shop put the rods on backwards (the rods have a mark on the front, one squirt hole for the cylinder walls that shoots the cam on the way around just for good measure). The caps are marked for the front too. The pistons have an offset dome that can only go one way. So you can see it was easy to pop the pistons in the right way and in order, then line the caps up and stick them on with the mark to the front. With the rods on the pistons backwards (I didn't look for the rod mark since the pisons can only go one way), the rod journals were just a little tight. It was a bit tough to turn by hand, but not so tough to suspect it was TOO tight. I found out about six months later. I was running two carbs and the jet got partially blocked on the rear one, causing an extreme lean condition in cylinder #6, which lead to a holed piston. I just pulled the head and dropp!
 ed the pan. When I pulled the rod cap the bearing was worn down to brass in a couple small areas -- with only 2500 miles on the engine!! So I pulled a main -- it was fine. Pulled another rod, same thing -- a couple small areas of brass showing!! Close inspection (this time!) revealed all rods were on backwards, so the caps were on backwards. Had to pull and resize all. The shop didn't want to risk cracking a piston, so suggested resizing as they were. That engine is still running as far as I know, but when Andre Jacobs rebuilt it again 4-5 years ago I told him about the rods. He had them resized correctly. I'm not sure if he reused the 0.040" over pistons or got new ones. 

On September 13, 2005 Ken Ames wrote:

> ... or maybe the engine was rebuilt too tight and will crater if it is run for
> any time.
> 
> :(
> 
>  Ken Ames
> 


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